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I complain a lot about not feeling comfortable wearing my UCSB hoodie around the streets of Bologna. The dress code here is posh (fur coats, fur hats (though no boots with the fur, surprisingly)) or street (slick track suits worn by teenage boys, mostly). It’s not so much a continuum as it is two separate worlds, so there’s really no place for my casual, comfortable hoodie.

I got a little insight into this the other day when I was sitting with Ludo. She’s really too young to judge my fashion sense, so I allow myself the comfort of my hooded sweatshirt in her presence. Then one day, she’s dressed in this adorable fuzzy lime green hoodie (different fashion rules apply to babies), and I pull her hood up because they keep the house too cold. She smiles up at me with her four teeth and leaves it because now we’re matching, and I think she digs that.

Her dad comes home a few hours later and laughs when he sees her. “Oh look, she’s a rapper! Yo yo yo!” Maybe the fashion rules aren’t so different for babies…